Highly Sensitive Personality (HSP)

What is High Sensitivity? High Sensitivity is a trait, not a disorder. It describes how some people (currently an estimated 20% of the population) experience the world more vividly and more deeply, requiring longer processing times.

Yet not all HSPs are sensitive in the same way: We currently distinguish between the following six subtypes:

• Psychomotoric sensitivity
• Sensory sensitivity
• Intellectual sensitivity
• Imaginative sensitivity
• Emotional sensitivity
• Extrasensory sensitivity

Not all HSPs are created alike

While some HSPs require low-sensory input and lots of quiet time to self-regulate, others may need the opposite: movement, sound, and stimulating colors.

Some HSPs have a strong sense of truth and justice, and tend to struggle in restrictive environments, such as large corporations or rigid school systems. They may primarily experience the world through their brilliant minds and live in the world of ideals.

Others, however, take in the world around them through their emotional center, and will express their love and care through tears, laughter, and hugs.

If you’ve been told in your life that you tend to notice subtleties others do not, if people have ever commented on your strong empathy or if you yourself have noticed a strong connection to your intuition, the concept of high sensitivity may resonate with you.

Challenges

While high sensitivity is a natural trait that is immensely important for the thriving of our collective, it can also lead to unique challenges, especially given the times and the cultural norms we live in:

• Sensory overwhelm by the outside world, large crowds, and busy environments
• Ambivalence around cultural and societal expectations, especially in the context of your career or academic success
• Struggles with interpersonal boundaries; in your romantic relationship, your family of origin, or with your own children. Highly sensitive people tend to either set too loose or too firm boundaries, and may settle into one rigid system with enmeshment on one end of the spectrum and hyperindependence on the other.
• Increased risk of exhaustion, health complications, and burnout. 

The Work

With such a nuanced awareness comes a therapeutic conversation around

• setting healthy boundaries
• caring for ourselves the way we care for others
• strategies to reduce masking and numbing (with or without substances)
• as well as to increase the authentic expression of the self- which interestingly often seems to come with great leadership potential.